Small Businesses Using Large Businesses As A Partner Instead of Competition

While looking around Amazon recently I noticed something odd when it came to a seller’s name. For awhile now people can essentially sell their stuff on the site which gives people an alternative from things like posting on classified ads or auction sites. A lot of consumers actually just think everything is from Amazon itself. But in this case the seller’s name was a known local computer store here in the province. To me that was a little surprising as this business does have its own website as well where it sells competing products. So instead of just competing with the larger corporation they are using them to help them generate more sales.

For those who aren’t too familiar with e-commerce and online shopping imagine this would be like a mom and pop store of sort that is essentially placing their goods in a large supermarket even though the supermarket sells the exact same item. The supermarket would still make money this way as they get things like a percent of the sale. Kind of a different way of looking at it in terms of a competitor as most people would normally think you would have to fight for your life against the giants to stay in business. In this case it could be an advantage for you.

It’s not a bad idea too if you are just starting out as this is essentially giving you a lot of free business exposure that you would have normally had to work hard to get. If you do a good job then I wouldn’t be surprised if a customer then starts to just go directly to that business’s website in the future. Sure sounds more appealing than spending thousands to compete against larger people when you aren’t quite there yet.